Participant Empowerment

Participant Empowerment
Reflection
In reflecting on my internship at the Simonka Place I feel that it is going well. The first couple of days I was feeling insecure and very nervous answering the phones. I knew what I was to say, but the words kept getting tangled together. By the third day they had be on the phones completely alone as the other girls supervised me. I began to get more confident as time went on. The one difficulty I do need to work on is to learn everyone’s names, so that when someone calls for them I know which page button to push.
Definition of Weekly Core Competency
This week’s core competency is participant empowerment, empowerment is the goal that is set for the client’s we are trying to help. Empowerment defies us and our basic assumptions about power, helping, achieving, and succeeding (Czuba, 1999). It is helping the participant to lead a self-determining life by providing the support and information necessary to build self-esteem and assertiveness to make decisions.
Participant empowerment is used at the Simonka Place to help the client to make good choices. The rules and the programs that are provided for the clients are there to help them to obtain a better life for themselves. When they come to the Simonka Place they have no power within themselves at all. This is where the caseworkers come in and help them to get turned around. Each client that comes in has the choice to choose whether they want to do the program that is there for them that will help to empower them so that their life’s can be meaningful.
While sitting at the front desk, a new client came up to me, she had just came in and looked so afraid. She shared that this was the very first time she had been on her own, and that she was really scared. I shared with her that she wasn’t alone that she had a great group…...

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Report produced for the EC funded project INNOREGIO: dissemination of innovation and knowledge management techniques
by
Apostolos Apostolou
D. of Production Engineering & Management Technical University of Crete
J
A N U A R Y
2 0 0 0
EMPLOYEE INVOLVEMENT
1
Contents
1 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 2 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 3 3.1 3.2 4
Description What is Employee Involvement and Empowerment Objectives Methodology Alternative techniques Expected Results / Benefits Characteristics of firms and service providers Application Where the technique has been applied Types of firms / organizations concerned Duration and Implementation cost European Organizations Supporting the implementation of the method Implementation Procedures Steps / Phases A few obstacles and recommended solutions Bibliographic References Annex
INNOREGIO project
A. Apostolou Technical University of Crete
EMPLOYEE INVOLVEMENT
2
1
DESCRIPTION
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Employee empowerment is creating a working environment where an employee is allowed to make his own decisions in specific work-related situations. It helps in giving platform to the employees for their words. It makes a healthy environment in a organization.
Guidelines for effective employee empowerment
• Select the right managers.
• Choose the right employees.
• Provide training.
• Offer guidance.
• Hold everyone accountable.
• Build trust.
• Focus on relationships.
• Transform mistakes into opportunities.
• Reward and recognize.
• Share authority instead of giving it up.
• Encourage disagree.
• Give it time.
• Share information.
• Realize that empowerment has its limitations.
• Watch for mixed messages.
• Involve employees in decision-making.
• Be prepared for increased variation.
Employee empowerment is good because of job satisfaction, motivation, productivity, creativity and innovation. Whilst it increases the efficiency in employees. Employees when empowered become more entrepreneurial and start taking more risks. Greater the risk, greater are the chances to succeed. As with the positivity there exist negativity, similarly there are many disadvantages of empowerment.
• Egotism / arrogance
• Security
• Risks
• Industrial democracy
Therefore the best executives are one who has the sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.
WHAT’S......

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